Rocky Mountain Conference Names New President

Ed Barnett has accepted a call by the Executive Committee of the Rocky Mountain Conference of Seventh-day Adventists to be the new conference president. Barnett replaces Gary Thurber, who recently accepted a call to be the executive secretary of the Lake Union Conference in Berrien Springs, Mich.

For nearly five years, Barnett has served as the president of the Minnesota Conference located in the Minneapolis area. Before that he served as ministerial and evangelism director for the Illinois Conference.

Elder Barnett is not a stranger to the Rocky Mountain Conference. He served as senior pastor for the Denver South Church from 1999 to 2006.

“We are excited about coming back to the Rocky Mountain Conference,” shared Barnett. “We enjoyed our time in Denver, and look forward to working with the Rocky Mountain family again.”

Barnett has a passion for evangelism. “My goal is to see every church in our territory involved in some form of evangelistic outreach every year,” says Barnett. “I want our churches to be creative in finding ways to engage their communities. But we should all be providing opportunities for reaping every year.”

Tom Lemon, Mid-America Union president said, “We are happy to welcome Elder Barnett to his new post. His experience and vision will undoubtedly go a long way toward furthering the advance of the gospel in our mountain region.”

Barnett has been married for 39 years to Shirley Anderson Barnett. Shirley works as an obstetrics nurse. They have two grown sons. Andrew works in information technology and is married to Lauren who is an RN. Ryan and Kay both work for Adventist Health System in Orlando, Fla.

Barnett expects to officially join the Rocky Mountain Conference on March 1st.